Overcoming the Threat to Black Movement with Charles T. Brown

The War on Cars

The War on Cars, LLC

Cars, Society & Culture, Culture, Bicycling, Politics, Urbanism, Walking, Transportation, Cities, Transit, News Commentary, News

4.9 • 937 Ratings

🗓️ 20 May 2025

⏱️ 51 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

Charles T. Brown is a longtime friend of the podcast who was last with us in 2023. We welcomed him back to talk about his important new book, Arrested Mobility: Overcoming the Threat to Black Movement, out now from Island Press.

Charles is the founder and principal of Equitable Cities, a minority- and veteran-owned urban planning, public policy and research firm focused at the intersection of transportation, health and equity. He is also an adjunct professor at the Edward J. Bloustein School of Planning and Public Policy at Rutgers University.

In Arrested Mobility, Charles applies his years of experience in the field to examine how what he calls “the four Ps”—policing, public policy, polity, and planning—come together to hold Black people back in fundamental ways, limiting their literal and figurative mobility. We talked about how to repair our cities, the importance of Black leadership, and what it truly means to “love thy neighbor”—as an urban planner and as a member of a community.

***Our new book, Life After Cars: Freeing Ourselves from the Tyranny of the Automobile, will be published on October 21, 2025 by Thesis, an imprint of Penguin Random House. Pre-order now.***

Support The War on Cars on Patreon and receive exclusive access to ad-free versions of regular episodes, Patreon-only bonus content, Discord access, invitations to live events, merch discounts and free stickers!

This episode was produced with the generous support of the Helen & William Mazer Foundation.

We are also supported by Cleverhood. Listen to the episode for the latest discount on the best and most stylish rain gear for walking and cycling.

Learn more about how an electric cargo bike can change your life and save $500 off a new bike with code WARONCARS500 at Xtracycle.

LINKS:

Buy Charles T. Brown’s book, Arrested Mobility: Overcoming the Threat to Black Movement, at our Bookshop page.

Check out Charles’s Arrested Mobility podcast and find out more about his work.

thewaroncars.org / lifeaftercars.com

Transcript

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0:00.0	As someone who got my start in bicycle advocacy a long time ago and who has commuted to work
0:06.8	by bike for decades, I'm kind of known as the bike guy.
0:11.2	But even though I've ridden all kinds of bikes, including an e-bike, for recreation and
0:15.7	transportation, up until now, I've never had an electric cargo bike. That changed recently when the good people at ExtraCycle loaned me the new RFA, a multi-purpose
0:27.3	compact electric cargo bike that really is ready for anything.
0:31.6	RFA, get it?
0:33.6	On the day I picked up the RFA from the Extra Cycle Showroom, I rode right to my son's school
0:39.0	to pick him up. Then I brought him to a doctor's appointment before taking him home. It
0:44.2	all took no time at all thanks to the electric assist. In the three weeks since I've had the
0:49.3	RFA, I've put over 75 miles on the bike, and most of those are just from trips around the neighborhood.
0:56.4	In addition to the school run, I've done some big grocery shopping trips.
1:01.0	I went to IKEA to buy a new desk chair.
1:03.8	I biked to a big home improvement store to get flowers, plants, and soil for spring gardening season.
1:09.3	I carried a few bags of old clothes to donate to a local charity, and I dropped off some overdue books at the library.
1:16.6	Sorry, fellow library patrons.
1:18.6	Thanks to the Extra Cycle RFA, I have been on a bicycle more in the past few weeks than I have in the past few months.
1:26.6	Nothing has felt too far away. No hill has felt
1:29.6	too steep. Plus, my errands haven't felt like chores. They've been fun. If anything, the more I ride
1:36.8	the RFA, the more I look for excuses to ride it again. It's safe to say that even for someone
1:42.1	like me, getting an e-cargo bike has totally changed my life.
1:47.3	Okay, but what if you are not a bike advocate or a podcast host who lives in a dense city with lots of bike infrastructure?
1:54.7	In the coming weeks, we will bring you stories from other extra cycle owners,
	...

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